Friday, March 19, 2021

Stop Asian Hate


Saturday, February 20, 2021

Monkey in a Nutshell

Wednesday, February 17, 2021

The Fam

I want to start drawing again but I'm going to keep it low key for now. Just doodles. I was starting to run out of steam before and the editing took too long. So I'll just be uploading doodles of the girls and maybe other stuff occasionally. 

Tuesday, October 27, 2020

Vote!

They told Monkey to rock the vote, but they didn't tell her how... 

Saturday, February 1, 2020

The Golden Orchard

"Maya almost didn’t hear her grandmother over the whir of the fan and the rumbling snores of Gizmo, the old and lazy pug dog squished by her side."

I have a new book out! Well, it's not quite a book book; it's an Audible Original audiobook. You can listen to it here!

I'm really excited about this book because it's one that took a while to find a home and it's also one that my dad, who passed away a year ago, helped with stories of his past in South Korea. The Golden Orchard is a middle grade fantasy fiction about food, family, memories, and time travel. And of course there's a pug in there!

The book is narrated by the fantastic Kathleen Choe. I insisted on a Korean American narrator and so her pronunciation of the Korean words in it is perfect!

Here's a description of the book and I really hope you'll like it!

Maya loves to cook with her grandmother—her Halmunee—to connect with the rich family history associated with each dish, a history Maya's mom would prefer stayed in the past. While cooking with her Halmunee one day, something remarkable happens: the food creates such a strong memory that it physically transports Maya and her Halmunee back in time into the memory itself. As her Halmunee explains, the women in her family have the gift of time travel through food—and Maya can do it too, if she practices. While eating her way through the past, Maya meets Jeff, another young time traveler who brings her to the Golden Orchard, a garden of memories filled with the trees of so many people's lives. Maya learns that time moves in ways she couldn't imagine, and sometimes families keep their memories secret to protect the ones they love.

Monday, February 11, 2019

PUG PALS: YAY FOR VAYCAY (Second book!)


Hello, friends!  I know it's been a while since I've posted here, but this past year has been crazy.  Crazy work, crazy book work, crazy family and health stuff.  Everything flew by so quickly, I'm still in a bit of shock that we're now in 2019. It's been a tough past few months.

But, the good news is that my second book in the PUG PALS series was released on January 29, 2019.  Yay!  Or I should say, YAY FOR VAYCAY!  After the first book, TWO'S A CROWD, the second book, YAY FOR VAYCAY, follows Sunny and Rosy as they visit their grandparents (aka my parents) for some time away while their human is traveling.  Adventures ensue!

Here's the blurb for it:
The pugs are packing their bags! 
Sunny and Rosy's human is going on vacation and it's NO DOGS ALLOWED. But they don't mind -- they're headed to Grandma and Grandpa's house for unlimited snuggles and as many pug snacks as they can eat. 
But when a mystery animal destroys Grandma's garden, the pugs get blamed. It's all paws on deck to clear their names. If they don't, their pugtastic vacay will be ruined!
And yes, there will be more pug yoga, dressing up in costumes, and sleepover shenanigans.

Sunny and Rosy are super excited about the second book!  But, Monkey is super jealous.  There's a new character in the second book, but it's a groundhog named Clover.  Monkey's not in the series yet, but if there are more books in the series maybe she'll pop up soon...

Look at how mad she is.  Look at that stink eye! 

 It was impossible for me to get a photo of the book with just Sunny and Rosy. 
 We were also on the front cover of some of the Scholastic flyers!

Isn't that cool?!  I used to loooove picking my books out of Scholastic flyers as a kid.  The best day was when we'd return from recess or lunch and there would be the small pile of books I ordered sitting in the corner of my desk.  Good times, good times.

The PUG PALS series is meant to appeal to a wide audience, so you don't need to be a pug lover to enjoy them.  Sunny and Rosy still do a lot of dogish things, but they also do stuff that nonfurry kids can relate to like fighting with siblings, visiting grandparents, dealing with adults not believing them, making new friends, and handling concepts like theft, caring for others, and unconditional love.

You don't need to have read the first book to enjoy the second, but the first book does add the background and setup to more fully enjoy book two.  Also, the more trade sales we get for both books, the better chance we have of more in the series, including an introduction of Monkey!

We hope that you all enjoy the PUG PALS series!  We all worked very hard on them!  (Well, I worked hard, the pugs snuggled and slept a lot).  Amazon links for the books below.  But you can also find them at Barnes & Noble, Target (online), Walmart (online), Book Depository (online) and your local bookstores and libraries.


 PUG PALS: YAY FOR VAYCAY (Amazon link)


Saturday, January 27, 2018

Welcome, Monkey!

A lot has happened this past year and I wanted to give an update.  The big one is MONKEY!  If you follow me on any of my social media, you'll already know about our new addition, Monkey, who joined us in summer 2017.  I was scrolling through Petfinder and found her at a Delaware shelter.  That very day I drove up to Delaware, saw her, and took her home.  She was 8 weeks at the time and my first puppy.  She was very sweet and quiet at first, but that didn't last long.  Monkey has turned our world upside down!  She's crazy, weird, energetic, and mischievous.  We also had a terrible health scare at the end of summer when she squeezed through a barbed wire fence and I couldn't find her and when I finally did get a hold of her she had a deep gash in her side (and other injuries on her sides and back) with some fat dangling out of it (I was horrified and immediately took her to the emergency vet).  She's now fully healed and is happy, loved, and a terror!  Sunny and Rosy took some time adjusting to her, but as you can see from the photos below, they've slowly but surely been accepting her as one of their own.

So this marks my first drawing of Monkey!  It took me a while to come up with a good way to draw her.  I would have preferred a way of doing it with just pen, but the shading was too dark and distracting.  So I think I found a happy medium with some pencil shading.  I could also do paint or marker, but I like keeping to the grittier look of pencils and pens.  What do you think?  Also, the circular thing in front of her is the tub drain hair catcher that she loves so so much.

Below are a ton of photos documenting our journey with Monkey:

Browsing through Petfinder, and what do I find?  This sad lil pug mix puppy.  Her temporary name was Pugly and I knew I had to drive the 3.5 hours to get her!
She was tiny!  At first she was confused and a little scared of the big world and all these changes in her life.
But soon she learned that she was going to have a wonderful life filled with fun and love!
But then tragedy struck!  One day as we were out in the yard, Monkey disappeared when I went inside to carry out Sunny.  After an hour of driving around and contacting neighbors, I finally discovered that she was stuck in the barbed wire of one of my back neighbor's fences.  With the help of my neighbor, Monkey got out and returned to our yard.  She was bleeding and had a huge gash in her side from which some fat dangled.  I was in shock.  I quickly scooped her into my arms and sped to the emergency vet.  It was a long recovery, but Monkey was a trooper.

On the plus side, she got to rock some adorable outfits while protecting her wounds while they healed.
And soon she was back to her wild, crazy, stick-loving self!
 
It's been quite an adventure with Monkey so far, and we haven't even had her for a year yet!  
She really loves this hair catcher for some reason.
Sunny and Rosy, especially Rosy, took some time getting used to her.  And in the past couple months, I've even caught them snuggling together!  So welcome to Monkey and my beautiful grumble!

Saturday, June 3, 2017

PUG PALS: TWO'S A CROWD Galley Giveaway Winners!

Thank you to everyone for all your support, encouragement, excitement, and kind words! I read each and every one of your comments and loved them all! I will continue to keep you all updated on PUG PALS: TWO'S A CROWD news as we get closer to the release date on January 30, 2018.

Now, onto the giveaway winners!

I assigned numbers to the comments on my previous post and ran a random number generator. Below are the winners names and the times they posted their comments to help avoid any confusion:

  • Marcia (posted at 7/1 7:03pm)
  • Beth Roy (posted at 5/31 12:57pm)
  • Kelly Jones (posted at 5/31 1:54pm)
  • Pug and Sue (posted at 5/31 6:08pm)
  • Dorothy (posted at 7/1 7:31am)
I'm also going to leave replies to the winners' comments on the previous post.  Please contact me at bahhumpug@gmail.com with your mailing address and I will send you a signed galley as soon as I can.  

Congratulations!

Wednesday, May 31, 2017

PUG PALS: TWO'S A CROWD COVER REVEAL!!!

I'm so excited to share the cover for my first book, PUG PALS: TWO'S A CROWD, that will be published by Scholastic in Spring 2018.

As you may recall, almost a year ago I posted my book deal announcement here. The series has been renamed from Pugling Rivalry, but the story has remained the same. Part of why I haven't been posting as much on my blog is that I've been super busy putting together the story and illustrations for my book. There was a steep learning curve in this process. Illustrating for a chapter book is very different from illustrating for a blog or social media posts. And I also was learning how to use Photoshop and a Cintiq, as all of the final illustrations were done digitally.

So you can imagine how rewarding it feels to finally see it all coming together at long last. And without further ado, the cover!

Friday, February 10, 2017

I Got The Boot!

 I got the boot!

Okay, let me back up here.  So about a week ago, it was raining when I got home from work.  I have an old house with front steps that have sunk over the years and so it's a bit of a step up to enter through my front door and I have to do it quick before the storm door behind me crashes against my leg.  Sunny and Rosy greeted me enthusiastically, with Rosy especially joyful and leaping at me with her helicopter tail and happy licks.  I slipped and stumbled, twisting my ankle.

Now, I'm not a doctor going kind of person.  Having grown up the daughter of a store owner with minimal health insurance, we didn't go to doctors regularly or for minor things.  I also just hate waiting forever in doctor's offices and it's so hard finding good doctors.  So, I did what I usually do and shook it off and moved on.  Over the week my ankle continued to hurt, but nothing terrible so I kept limping around.

Fast forward to this week, and I'm back to taking the metro (I was driving to work for the most part of the past year) and walking for my commute and my ankle starts to hurt a lot more.  Then, I woke up on Thursday and I couldn't put any weight on my left leg.  I hobbled to work, thinking I could still power through but everyone noticed and commented on my terrible limp and grimace of pain.  So, FINE, I'll go to a doctor!

Turns out, I'd fractured it.  So into the boot my left foot went and will stay for the next few weeks.  Ugh.  I hate it already.

Look at what you helped make happen, pugs!
They don't care.  They were just happy to see me.
Could they be any more lil beans here?  Also, look at Rosy's helicopter tail go!
P.S. I am just now noticing that my hair in the drawing totally makes me look like Wolverine.  That is all.

Oh, and on a random note, I've been outed at my work as the author of this blog and I know that some of my coworkers now visit it.  One even went so far as to pressure me for a guest appearance of his own dog.  So, below are two of my coworkers' dogs that I met recently.  You know who you are.  And I know who you are.  It is known.

Monday, January 30, 2017

Happy Lunar New Year

Happy Lunar New Year! We're excited because it's the year of the rooster and that's my year. Plus...drumsticks.

Sunny's just glad that Rosy's fixated on someone else's drumsticks. She needs a break from Rosy's drumstick attacks every now and then. Though, Sunny's will always be Rosy's favorite.

Thursday, January 19, 2017

Free Pug Hugs

Sunny's offering free pug hugs for those in need of some comfort right now.

You'll have to wait until Rosy's done. That might take a while...

Tuesday, November 8, 2016

Vote

Happy election day!

Tuesday, October 4, 2016

Pug Magic

I, sans pugs, will be going to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter soon with my niece and nephew.  I've been rereading the series before our trip to get in the mood and remind me of everything since I haven't read some of the books since they were released.

I'd love to hear any tips or advice from those who have gone before.  Also, most importantly, are there any good souvenirs I can get for the pugs?

Thursday, September 22, 2016

Problems Every Small Dog Understands

Rosy has a weird relationship with our neighboring dogs. She generally fears/hates strange dogs, especially big ones, as I don't think she was properly socialized with her prior family or maybe she had a bad experience. But she sees our neighboring dogs on a daily basis so she's kind of used to them and super intrigued by them.

The German Shepard mix that lives next to us is so patient with Rosy. Just a few days ago, Rosy barked at her (as usual) and then calmed down enough to sniff. But Rosy's so tiny she can practically walk under most big dogs. Next thing I know, Rosy's standing up on her back legs, her front paws planted on the big dog's butt cheeks, and sniffing deeply. She really got in there!

Sunny and I were mortified.

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

Hot and Humid

I complain all the time about the heat and humidity, but now that it's late September I feel like my complaints are totally valid and justified. I also had the wonderful idea to cut my hair a little shorter than usual this past weekend and now it's curling and frizzing like crazy.

It's time for summer to take the hint and go away and take all the bugs with it too. This week is summer's last hurrah here and it's so muggy and gross and the mosquitoes are going crazy for their last bites.

Of course, no matter what the weather is like, my super warm, barnacle love bug pugs want to glom onto my body and snuggle 24/7. Normally I love it, but sometimes it gets to be a bit much and overheats me. The humidity also brings out the delightful pet store aroma from their usual fritolicious scent. (Ooh that reference to a pet store just reminded me to buy more dog food before we run out).

Summer, it's not me. It's you. Go away. Come back next year when we're all tired of the cold.

Friday, September 16, 2016

What To Do When You See a Bug in Your Home

I hate bugs.  I hate them with a passion.

One of the things I hate about them the most is that they like to hang out on the ceiling of my bedroom.  I don't know if it's because my bedroom is essentially the attic or they like the sloped ceilings or what.  By now I've developed a tried and true method that I've outlined in this illustration. Enjoy.

Friday, September 9, 2016

Weekend Plans

Happy Friday!

I don't know if it's because summer is ending or what, but I've been feeling extra lazy lately.  So this weekend, I'll be relaxing with my pugs.  Hope you all have a great weekend too!